A figure by which a more comprehensive term is used for a less comprehensive or <
i>vice versâ; as whole for part or part for whole, genus for species or species for genus, etc.

Formerly sometimes used loosely or vaguely, and not infrequently misexplained.

1388Wyclif's Bible, Prol. xi
i. (1850) 47 Bi a figure clepid synodoches [v.r. synadochie], whanne a part is set for al, either al is set for oo part.

1432-50 tr. Higden (Rolls) IV. 263 Criste was seide to be in the..herte of therthe thre daies and iij.
ny3htes by a figure callede sinodoches, after Seynte Austyn, sythe Criste reste not in his sepulcre but by xlti howres.

1483 Caxton Gold. Leg., Resurr. (1892) 52 Jhesus was in the sepulcre iii dayes & iii nyghtes. But
after saynt austyn the first day is taken by synecdoche, that is, that the last part of the day is taken [etc.];

1548 R. Hutten Sum of Diuinitie E ij b, They imagyne a Sinecdoch to be in thys worde.

1638 Chillingw. Relig. Prot.i. v. Sect.94. 295 By a Synecdoche of the whole for the part, he might be s
aid to forsake the Visible Church.

1657 J. Smith Myst. Rhet. 44 Of the Grammarians it is called a Synecdoche, or Comprehension, when a common word or name is restrained to a part which is expressed by the Accusative Case..: as,
Æthiops albus dentes, an Ethiopian white in the teeth; here, white agreeing to the teeth only, is attributed to the whole Ethiopian.

1660 Jer. Taylor Worthy Commun.i. iii. 58 It is by a Metonymy and a Sacramenta
l Manner of speaking, yet it is also a synecdoche of the part for the whole.

1718-31 J. Trapp tr. Virg., Ecloguesi. 87 note (ed. 2) I. 11 Aristas, by a Metonymy of the Adjunct, for Harvests; and Those by a S
ynecdoche, for Years.